Statement by the ANC Limpopo on the appointment of the ANC municipal mayors

Statement by the ANC Limpopo on the appointment of the ANC municipal mayors

24 May 2011

The ANC provincial leadership in Limpopo met today to discuss the outcomes of the 2011 Local Government Elections. The meeting was extremely pleased by the election results, with Limpopo retaining its place as the province with the highest support for the ANC in excess of 80%. The ANC retained control of 100% municipalities in the province.

The meeting welcomed a generally incident-free campaign and election process. The entire campaign and the results are a tribute to a cadre of committed ANC members and leaders who committed time and endless hours to ensure our victory. The ANC provincial leadership sincerely thanks our members who continue to work selflessly for the movement.

To us as the ANC, the 2011 elections is just one moment in the long-haul struggle for the liberation of our oppressed and exploited people. Therefore, our members should continue to mobilise and organise our people to be conscious actors of their own liberation. This also includes organising our poor people as active members of the ANC to ensure that the ANC continues to be the organ for the self-emancipation of our people.

During our door-to-door, visits in taxi-ranks, all religious meetings, soccer fields, workplaces and farms, the ANC has clearly heard and understood your appreciation of what the ANC-led government in its totality, and local government in particular in the last 17 years. We understood that the 17 years of democracy has not addressed the legacy more than 300 years of colonial exploitation, oppression and land dispossession.

The electoral victory is a clear affirmation that it is only the ANC that has the interest, the will and capacity to ensure a better life for all our people. For the ANC, this 2011 electoral victory means that we need to accelerate the process of changing the conditions of our people through amongst other things, meeting their basic needs – electricity, water, housing and jobs. However, the ANC-led government cannot be able to address these challenges alone without the participation of our people. We need a critical and organised citizenry that engages our local state and business to create jobs and meet their basic needs.

This electoral victory is not a blank cheque to our councillors and mayors to do as they wish. Instead, they have to be the real representatives of the people in line with the ANC values and principles and programs as entailed in the 2011 electoral manifesto. The ANC manifesto was not just a list of commitments. These are implementable programs that ANC will carry out together with our people. All these electoral commitments will be translated into the municipal Integrated Development Plans as well as the Local Government Turn-Around Strategy.

The ANC is also fully aware that our municipal financial audit outcomes are not impressive. In line with the 2014 Clean Audit goals the ANC will ensure that our municipalities` financial management capacity is improved.

The meeting today endorsed the full list mayors who will serve as our front line cadres to implement and carry out our commitments. Apart from clear goals and targets, these mayors have a clear understanding of what is expected of them and what they will be measured against.

The ANC wishes them well in carrying out their responsibilities to the ANC and most importantly to the people who put their trust in them by electing them. We once again thank the people of this province for the confidence they have in the ANC and for participating to entrench our democracy.

The ANC also wishes to thank the media for its role and conduct in the elections, including urging people to exercise their vote. We also thank them for allowing and promoting healthy debate among political parties on their various platforms.

However, the ANC in Limpopo wishes to take this opportunity to reject with contempt some offensive and slanderous media reports as seen in today`s Sowetan (24 May 2011). An article in this newspaper alleged that the ANC leadership will reward its senior cadres regarded as close allies of the current ANC YL President Cde Julius Malema with strategic positions in our municipalities.

Such reports are an attempt to blackmail the ANC leadership from implemeting democratic decisions of our movement. These reports are also an assault on the collective wisdom and political leadership authority of the PEC in the province. They are further an attack on the person and political integrity of the ANC Provincial Chairperson Cde Cassel Mathale.

It is simply not true that Cde Malema has a grip or power over the ANC leadership in the province. The ANC YL President Cde Malema has no authority or powers to dictate to the elected leadership pertaining to strategic deployments in the province.

The deployment of cadres of the ANC and its allies in various strategic sites of power, particularly municipalities, is the prerogative responsibility of the ANC`s Deployment Committee and its structures.